Shifter village (grisha's past)
by TheAnimeAsylum
Summary: This is the story of Grisha Jaeger's youth. It is how I imagined it and does contain some of my own theories on the shifter village, the beast titan's identity, Grisha's past, etc. It is also my first fanfic, so sorry for my crappy writing :3 at the moment its a one-shot, but i will extend it to a two-shot if it gets enough views. enjoy!
1. Chapter 1

_WARNING: SPOILERS!_

 _This is the story of Grisha Jaeger's youth. It is how I imagined it and does contain some of my own theories on the shifter village, the beast titan's identity, Grisha's past, etc. It is also my first fanfic, so sorry for my crappy writing :3 enjoy!_

Grisha Jaeger was a small, serious, curious child. He was dark haired and constantly wore a look of deep interest in everything. He was not very sociable, and preferred to be by himself or with his older brother Yarrick rather than play with the other children in the Shifter Village. He was deeply intrigued by all that was inside and outside the village, and he was especially intrigued by the Shifters of his race that protected them from the "Numb" outside of their boundaries.

Most of the time the villagers stayed away from the boundaries and the Shifters when in their true forms. The limited group of Shifter families within the village where given the utmost respect of everyone else, and received most of the food they harvested from the farms. The Shifters patrolled the borders, switching patrols every three hours, which was the limit for the more experienced and well-practised members.

The village children were often told horrifying stories about the world outside, with stories of the terrible Numb Ones and exiled Shifters scaring the village children away from ever going near the boundary clearings.

Grisha, however, was immune to these stories and their effects, and searched always for more information about the enlightened Shifters. He had never seen a Numb One or a Shifter in their true form before, so naturally, he was curious.

But Grisha was soon to learn just how dangerous curiosity can be, and how too much of it can lead you down a treacherous path.

The day the accident happened was one sunny summer afternoon. Grisha was indescribably bored, and with nothing to do, was sitting on the porch of the Jaeger family house. His mother was inside preparing the nights dinner by plucking birds, and his father had gone out to barter at the market for cattle. Yarrick was chopping firewood outside, and Grisha watched him from the porch steps, chewing on a piece of straw.

Yarrick looked over at him, his blonde hair slicked with sweat from lifting the heavy axe that he held by his side.

"Y'know, Grisha, instead of sitting idly chewing straw, you could actually get of your butt and come and help me… c'mere, have a go."

Grisha scowled and turned away, answering quietly.

"Stop teasing me. You know I'm not strong enough to lift an axe yet, let alone chop wood with one."

"Aww, c'mon Grish, y'know I'm just playing. Dontcha know how to take a joke?" Yarrick grinned widely, his white teeth gleaming in the afternoon sunlight. He put down the axe and went over and sat beside Grisha.

Yarrick knew Grisha hated being the youngest in the family, and he also knew how envious Grisha was of him. He was four years older than Grisha, who was only twelve. Yarrick was treated like a man by everyone else, and Grisha was treated like a child. Grisha had always been the quietly rebellious one, and hated being ignored by everyone else.

Grisha's amber eyes looked up at Yarrick, and they gave away his anger. He stood up, a look of frustration in his eyes. He turned to look at Yarrick. He wore a determined expression on his face, and smiled down at Yarrick.

"I'm bored."

Yarrick looked at him questioningly.

"What?'

Grisha stood up. He began to stride quickly toward the other end of the garden, which faced the forest and the boundary line.

"What are you doing, Grisha?" Yarrick asked nervously. "You know we aren't allowed into the forest. The boundary line's out there…"

"Yeah, and I'm going to cross it. " answered Grisha, without turning round, as he neared the edge of the garden and the start of the tree

"W-what the hell Grish, you're not serious, are you? That's mental. You're going to get eaten!" Yarrick got to his feet, worry all over his face.

Grisha ignored him, and broke into a sprint. He was heading straight for the trees, running as fast as he could.

"Grisha!"

Yarrick stumbled, and reached for the axe. He ran, trying to catch up with Grisha, who had disappeared into the trees.

"GRISHA! COME BACK!" he screamed, as he ran away from the sunny garden and into the dark, hungry forest.


	2. Chapter 2

Branches whipped against the small boy's face as he ran wildly through the sunlight-dappled forest, jumping over fallen logs and swerving to avoid ditches and small ponds. His face was covered with small red scratches, but Grisha didn't care. This was the most fun he had had in ages; his brain was dizzy with adrenalin and he could feel his heart pounding against his ribs. Dimly, he heard Yarrick's footsteps far behind him, but Yarrick's shouts of warning fell on deaf ears. Grisha was free, with no stupid rules to keep him penned in like cattle anymore. Yarrick could shout all he wanted, Grisha wasn't turning back.

"Grisha! IT'S DANGEROUS OUT THERE!" Yarrick yelled, to no avail.

He stumbled, tripped over a broken branch and hit the ground hard.

"aaagh!" he hissed through teeth clenched against the pain. By the feel of it, he'd twisted his ankle. Oh no. If he didn't get up now, he was going to lose Grisha. He grabbed the branch he'd tripped over and heaved himself up. Leaning heavily against the branch, he limped as fast as he could towards the boundary.

Grisha had reached the clearing. The boundary lay in front of him. It was a large, deep ditch dug into the ground. A few wooden spikes lay around the edges, but that was it. The village mostly relied upon the Shifters to keep them safe.

Grisha smiled. This was easy. He ran forward, and used the momentum to propel himself over the boundary. He teetered on the edge for a few seconds, but managed to pull himself upright.

He hadn't noticed it yet. It had been watching him through the leaves of a large bush, and its tiny brain was almost overcome with the urge to leap out and devour the small human now. But there was still one tiny part of its mind that knew to wait, to lie and watch.

Grisha sensed something. A noise. A cavernous, rattling, inhale and exhale.

It was a Numb One.

Yarrick limped out into the clearing, to see Grisha standing on the other side. He tried to call out to him, but completely lost track of what he was about to see as he noticed the thing in the bush, looking right at Grisha, as if he was a juicy piece of steak that it would very much like to devour.

He looked around; pinpointing the exact place the sound was coming from.

That bush! He was sure. Grisha stopped for a minute, hesitating. A small voice told him not to do it, that it was dangerous.

But years of pent up frustration against the rules won out. Grisha strode towards the bush.

He could see it through the leaves. Two small, beady eyes stared at him. A cavernous red mouth filled with huge tombstone-sized teeth breathed out the sickly-sweet stench of rotten meat every time it exhaled.

"C-Can you understand me?" Grisha asked, trying not to sound as scared as he felt and failing.

The creature stared at him blankly, the rattling breaths the only sound it made in response.

Grisha tried again.

"D-Do you know what I'm sayi-"

He was cut off as the creature jumped out from the bush and its huge meaty hand grabbed him roughly, squeezing the air from his lungs.

Yarrick saw the whole thing unfold in the blink of an eye. Grisha's scream was hardly over before Yarrick had reached the other side of the ditch, adrenalin granting him strength to ignore the fiery pain in his ankle. He raised the stick, no longer a crutch, but a weapon, and ran towards the titan.

Grisha was whimpering, as the creature raised him towards the huge, widening red gash that was its mouth. The stench of rotting corpses washed over him, making him gag.

"DON'T YOU FUCKING TOUCH MY BROTHER!" Yarrick screamed, throwing his stick; hopefully years of throwing rocks at the birds in the village square would make sure he didn't miss.

It hit the titan right in the centre of its eye. The creature roared with pain and dropped Grisha to tend to its wound. Grisha fell to the floor, gasping. Yarrick limped over to help him, all of his energy gone.

"C'mon ya stupid little idiot. He won't be injured for long." Yarrick said hoarsely. Grisha gasped and tried to stand up, but his legs gave way.

"Grish, don't worry, it's all right now. Come on, quic-"

Too late. Grisha had been trying to tell him. The titan, recovered from the injury he had dealt it, plucked Yarrick off the ground by his legs, dangling him in the air.

Grisha watched in horror as it raised him to its mouth.

Yarrick struggled upside-down to break free, but he had no energy left.

Yarrick screamed as Grisha watched, horrified-

There was nothing he could do-

And the titan's huge teeth crunched through muscle and bone-

There was so much blood-

"YARRICK!" Grisha screamed in vain.

And all of a sudden, Yarrick didn't have his legs anymore.

Grisha was paralysed with fear. Yarrick seemed to fall from the mouth of the titan in slow motion, blood spraying from the stumps where his legs used to be. He thumped onto the ground, staining the earth around him red. He wasn't screaming any more, he wasn't even moving. His brain seemed to have shut down from shock.

Grisha ran to him, tears streaming down his cheek. This was his fault; he was so stupid, if only he hadn't been so tempted by the outside world Yarrick wouldn't be like this. He bent over his brother, his tears falling onto Yarrick's freckled face.

But Grisha's grief was interrupted. There came a mighty roar, not from the titan that had been attacking him, but from a new individual. Grisha looked up. There stood a towering figure, easily taller than two houses stacked on top of each other. Apart from its face, hands and feet, it was covered in brown, shaggy fur. It regarded the two on the ground and... It winked at Grisha? Wait, that was impossible - unless...

It was a Shifter! They were saved! Grisha, spurred by this hope, grabbed Yarrick under the armpits and started to drag him to the bush where the titan had been hiding. He grabbed some moss and applied it to Yarrick's stumps, trying desperately to stop the bleeding.

Meanwhile, behind him, the two titans circled each other, both sizing up their opponent. The smaller titan went for the first attack, springing forwards to clamp its huge jaws around the Shifter's leg.

The Shifter regarded it with disdain.

"We can't have pets that bite, now can we?" it growled, like an animal that had just learned to speak. It reached down its long fingered hand and calmly pulled the smaller titan off its leg by its oversized head. The Shifter then promptly grabbed the titan's chin in its huge hand, and in one swift move, ripped off its entire lower jaw, tossing the bloody hunk of meat into the forest. He dropped the creature boredly, as though he were a cat playing with a mouse.

The smaller titan whimpered in pain, and decided that this was a fight it couldn't win. It began to crawl away on its belly, heading for the trees.

"Not so fast." growled the Shifter, and reached for a tree that was growing nearby, ripping it out of the ground as if it was merely picking a flower. It pinned the titan on its stomach, and stabbed it through the back with the tree, puncturing it all the way through its body until the end of the tree was imbedded in the ground, skewering the smaller titan.

"Ha. A Numb kebab." The Shifter remarked rather absent-mindedly. It then knelt down and bit into the flesh of the feebly wriggling titan, ripping away the nape of its neck in one clean move.

Grisha heard the horrible noise of flesh ripping, but was focusing too much on Yarrick to look around.

"Yarrick? Can you hear me? Listen, you've got to hold on, help's already came, we're saved!" said Grisha urgently.

Yarrick looked up at Grisha, smiling weakly.

"No, Grish. There's no way I'll be able to hold on much longer."

"That's not true!" said Grisha, wiping tears from his eyes with his sleeve.

"Don't worry about me, Grisha." Yarrick said, reaching up to wipe Grisha's tears away with his own hand, stroking his little brother's cheek. "All that matters is that you're safe." Yarrick said weakly, still smiling. Grisha watched in shock as Yarrick's eyes slowly closed, and felt his brother's hand slide off his cheek and drop to the floor.

"Yarrick... No..." Grisha whispered hoarsely, and more tears flooded down his face, as he pressed his stupid, teasing, and immeasurably kind big brother's forehead to his chest. He didn't utter another word, simply sat there hugging Yarrick's lifeless body, silently crying tears to fill the new gaping hole inside his heart.

The Shifter titan collapsed, and a fist punched through the flesh at the nape of its neck as its controller clawed his way out from inside.

"Whew. That was easier than I expected it to be." the man said, sweeping his long black hair out of his eyes and adjusting his glasses. He stepped down from the now-decomposing titan corpse, and looked around. He scratched his right ear absent-mindedly and scanned the area. While he was fighting, he had noticed some kids out of the corner of his eye. He hoped they were alright, he could have hit them without knowing...

He spotted them, over by the bush. The smaller one crouched over the larger one, but he couldn't see their faces properly as their backs were turned to him. Something about them seemed familiar, though...

"Hey, you okay, kid?" he said, smiling to not scare the child.

The smaller kid heard him approaching and looked around. Tears ran down his face, smearing the lenses of his glasses. The kid looked up at him, shock on his face as his brain slowly registered who it was that was standing in front of him.

"D-Dad?" Grisha croaked.

The Shifter's grin disappeared from his face, and was replaced with a look of horror.

"Grish? Oh god, are you alright?"

"Yeah, b-but..." Grisha said, looking back to what he was holding, choking back tears.

The Shifter caught a glimpse of blond hair, freckles and a large amount of blood.

"Yarrick..." he whispered, taking the boy out of Grisha's arms.

He sat there, his son in his arms, rocking Yarrick as if he was a child. Grisha's father didn't say a word, and they both sat there on the ground, both wrapped in their individual grief.

Yarrick was dead.

And it was all Grisha's fault.


End file.
